Page 85 of Gift from the Tree

Since waking up this morning, nestled against Draken’s warm chest, my sex drive has been in overdrive, and all I want to do right now is find him and have him take care of this problem for me. I’ve caught his heated gaze run up and down my body multiple times this morning, and it’s done nothing but stoke the fire burning in my belly.

“Ms. Willow, I heard about the incident yesterday. I’m terribly sorry that happened to you. If you aren’t feeling up to a demonstration this morning, we can put it off until the next class,” Professor Erin, my Air Elemental instructor, says as she pulls me to the side.

“Thank you. I appreciate that, but I should be fine. I’m feeling a lot better this morning.” Other than this fucking raging lady boner I’ve got going on.

“Wonderful. Well, whenever—Oh, Headmaster Vito, I wasn’t expecting you this morning.” Even if her eyes didn’t travel over my head, the physical reaction my body has would’ve told me he’s standing behind me.

“Good morning, Professor Erin. Sorry for dropping in unannounced, but I wanted to see how Willow’s demonstration went.” The professionalism in his tone sucks all the dirty thoughts from my mind. I don’t like that formal tone directed at me, like I’m just another student.

Turning, I squint my eyes at him, crossing my arms over my chest. “I haven’t demonstrated anything yet.”

“Perfect timing. I’ll administer the test then,” he declares, sliding his suit jacket off. I can’t help but watch as his biceps strain against the fabric of his white dress shirt and my appreciation doesn’t go unnoticed. When I look back up to him, his eyes are heated for a brief moment before the emotionless mask is slammed back in place.

“Oh, that would be lovely. What an honor, Willow. Headmaster Vito has the strongest air element to date,” Professor Erin raves like a proud mother.

“Wonderful,” I reply sarcastically as I hold his gaze, trying to figure out what the fuck he’s up to.

Professor Erin pats me on the arm, turning to Corentin. “I’ll leave you to it then. Let me know what areas she’ll need the most work in.”

“What are you doing?” I ask the moment she’s out of earshot.

“I wanted to make sure you didn’t send our Air Elemental instructor flying across the arena,” he responds with his smart-ass attitude.

Sneering, I walk past him, fully intending to bail from this class if he’s going to be the one doing this demonstration this morning. “I’m suddenly not feeling too well. Looks like I’ll have to do this with Professor Erin next class.”

I don’t make it a step past him before he’s pulling my back flush to his front, leaning low to my ear.

“Based on the noises I heard coming from Draken’s bedroom last night, I’m pretty sure you feel fine, better than fine, actually. Now, go get in position and prepare for your demonstration.”

He sends me stumbling with a tap to my ass, and I whirl around to give him a fucking piece of my mind, but the challenge in his eye makes me bite my tongue. He’s testing me. He wants a reaction from me, but fuck that. If all I get is this bullshit emotionless mask, he isn’t getting shit from me.

“Fine. What do I do, Headmaster?” I ask, adding in a little curtsy just to be a bitch.

“Simple, princess. Repeat what I do, and we’ll get an idea of where you are or where you’re not with your control.” His emphasis on not pisses me all the way off. He knows good and damn well I worked hard all last week to get control over my air.

Okay, king of the assholes, let’s do this.

For the next hour, Corentin makes me go through a series of tests. Moving objects from one side of the arena to the other, lifting objects of different weights, taking control of air that I didn’t create and so on. If you ask me, I fucking crushed it. It didn’t go unnoticed that instead of just verbally correcting me when I did get something wrong, he made it a point to touch me, move me, get as far in my personal space as he possibly could.

I’m a ball of confusion by the time we finish with the demonstration, pissed off at him for being an asshole the entire time, barking orders left and right, and incredibly turned on from his constant touch. There was no reason for me to be feeling this for him when Draken’s face was literally buried between my thighs last night.

“Come on, time to go,” he orders as he slips his suit jacket back on.

“Aren’t you going to tell me how I did? And go where? Draken’s coming to get me,” I question.

“I told him to just meet at my office. You did fine.” He turns away from me and begins walking in the direction of his office without even checking to see if I’m following.

Bossy, controlling asshole.

We’re the last to arrive in his office and I barely cross the threshold before I’m being lifted off my feet and spun around. “Little wanderer, I missed you. Did you kill your air demonstration?”

My laugh turns into a groan as he slowly lowers me down his body and I quickly cover it with a cough. “I’m not sure. Ask our oh so generous headmaster how I did since he took time out of his precious day to come administer it himself?”

Draken tosses his head back laughing. “Corentin, you didn’t.”

“Professor Erin would’ve gone easy on her, and I needed to see what class she’d really be best suited for. She’s getting moved up to the second-year class and we’ll go from there,” Corentin says, shrugging his shoulder.

“Seriously? You don’t think I need the first-year class at all?” I knew I crushed it, but I didn’t think I did good enough to skip a whole class.

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